Event Calendar
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Performances and Films/Videos
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Exhibitions
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Free Hours at L.A. Museums (PDF, 269 KB)
Autry National Center
Craft and Folk Art Museum
Fowler Museum at UCLA
Hammer Museum
Huntington Library
Japanese American National Museum
LACMA
Los Angeles Public Library
MAK Center for Art & Architecture
MOCA
Museum of Latin American Art
Natural History Museum
Norton Simon Museum
Orange County Museum of Art
Pacific Asia Museum
Pasadena Museum of California Art
Santa Monica Museum of Art
Skirball Cultural Center
Exhibitions
February 5, 2012
Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture and Decorative Arts
New Galleries for Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture and Decorative Arts
Daily

North Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


A newly designed installation of medieval and Renaissance European sculpture and decorative arts is now on view in the J. Paul Getty Museum's North Pavilion at the Getty Center. Displayed with paintings, drawings, and illuminated manuscripts that enrich their context, the works of art are arranged by period and theme. The installation features innovative technologies, including interactive touch screens, that enhance the visitor's experience.

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Greetings from L.A.: Artists and Publics, 1950-1980
Greetings from L.A.: Artists and Publics, 1950–1980
Daily through February 5, 2012

Research Institute Exhibition Gallery, Getty Center


Beginning in the 1950s, Southern California saw the emergence of newly diverse audiences for art. While gallerists cultivated collectors, Beat artists Wallace Berman and George Herms distributed handcrafted works among friends. Others, including Chris Burden, exploited the mass media to circulate their work. Art schools became innovative forums for artists such as Judy Chicago and John Baldessari. Social and political movements that championed peace and feminism mobilized artists to take their messages to the streets. Drawn from the Getty Research Institute's archives of Los Angeles art, this exhibition features photographs, ephemera, correspondence, and artwork—many on view for the first time—that reveal how these artists disseminated their works to a broader public.

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De Wain Valentine's Gray Column
From Start to Finish: De Wain Valentine's Gray Column
Daily through March 11, 2012

West Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


Gray Column was one of the largest sculptures De Wain Valentine ever cast with polyester resin—the material with which he worked throughout the 1960s and 1970s to create his dazzling circles and columns. This monumental, free-standing slab, measuring twelve feet high and eight feet wide, was abandoned in 1975 and only completed for this exhibition. Curated by the Getty Conservation Institute and on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum, From Start to Finish tells the story of how this extraordinary piece was made and features preparatory drawings and maquettes, videos documenting the fabrication process, interviews with the artist, and a discussion of the conservation of this sculpture. This Getty Center exhibition is part of the region-wide Pacific Standard Time initiative.

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Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Painting and Sculpture, 1950-1970
Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Painting and Sculpture, 1950–1970
Daily through February 5, 2012

Exhibitions Pavilion, Getty Center


Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Painting and Sculpture, 1950–1970 charts the abundant artistic innovation in postÐWorld War II Los Angeles. During this period, Los Angeles artists looked for new approaches, subjects, and techniques for art making, including experimenting with the materials and processes of the pioneering industries in the region and the local surf and car cultures. The exhibition leads viewers on a dynamic tour from the emergence of an indigenous strain of modernism evident in the hard-edge paintings, assemblage sculpture, and large-scale ceramics of the 1950s, to the subsequent development of iconic Pop images of the city in the 1960s, and the conceptual and material contributions of Light and Space art and process painting that fostered the advanced art of the 1970s. This Getty Center exhibition is part of the region-wide Pacific Standard Time initiative.

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Lyonel Feininger: Photographs
Lyonel Feininger: Photographs, 1928–1939
Daily through March 11, 2012

West Pavilion, Terrace Level, Getty Center


A highly regarded painter, printmaker, and draftsman, Lyonel Feininger (American, 1871–1956) was the first master appointed to the newly established Bauhaus in Weimar, Germany, in 1919. Like many other figures at the innovative art school, Feininger turned to photography as a tool for visual exploration. Beginning in 1928 and for the next decade, he used the camera to explore transparency, reflection, night imagery, and the effects of light and shadow. Organized by the Harvard Art Museum/Busch-Reisinger Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts, in cooperation with the J. Paul Getty Museum, this exhibition presents the first comprehensive overview of little-known photographs by one of the most important artists of the twentieth century. The presentation at the Getty is accompanied by a selection of Bauhaus photographs from the Museum's permanent collection. The exhibition, tour, and catalogue were funded in part through the generosity of the German Friends of the Busch-Reisinger Museum, the Terra Foundation for American Art, the Dedalus Foundation, Inc., and the Emily Rauh Pulitzer and Joseph Pulitzer Jr. Fund for Modern and Contemporary Art, Harvard Art Museums.

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Narrative Interventions in Photography
Narrative Interventions in Photography
Daily through March 11, 2012

West Pavilion, Terrace Level, Getty Center


Featuring contemporary artists Eileen Cowin (American, born 1947), Carrie Mae Weems (American, born 1953), and Simryn Gill (Singaporean, born 1959), this exhibition explores the concept of storytelling through three distinct bodies of photographic works. Cowin's images present a philosophical questioning of narrative and what is fact or fiction; Weems's art attempts to rewrite a profound aspect of human history; while photographs by Gill reflect a more personal interaction with stories through deconstructed books. Although each artist has a different approach, all are concerned with photography and the notion of narrative: implied, real, or revised.

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Images of the Artist
Images of the Artist
Daily through February 12, 2012

West Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


Images of the Artist investigates some of the ways in which artists have represented themselves, their fellow artists, or their trade over the past five centuries. Raising compelling issues about identity and image-making, this rich theme is explored through a selection of over 40 objects—mostly drawings but also prints, photographs, paintings, and sculpture—from the permanent holdings of the J. Paul Getty Museum, complemented by loans from local collections. Works range from portraits and self-portraits to depictions of the artist's life and space as well as allegorical images.

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In Focus: Los Angeles
In Focus: Los Angeles, 1945–1980
Daily through May 6, 2012

West Pavilion, Terrace Level, Getty Center


This exhibition presents approximately twenty-five photographs from the Museum's permanent collection made in Los Angeles between 1945 and 1980. Both iconic and relatively unknown works are featured by artists whose careers are defined by their association with the city, who may have lived in Los Angeles for a few brief but influential years, or whose visit inspired them to create memorable images. Works by Robert Cumming, Joe Deal, Judy Fiskin, Anthony Friedkin, Robert Heinecken, Anthony Hernandez, Man Ray, Edmund Teske, William Wegman, Garry Winogrand, Max Yavno and others are loosely grouped around the themes of experimentation, street photography, architectural depictions, and the film and entertainment industries. <br><br> This Getty Center exhibition is part of the region-wide Pacific Standard Time initiative.

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Gothic Grandeur
Gothic Grandeur: Manuscript Illumination, 1200–1350
Daily through May 13, 2012

North Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


The word "Gothic" evokes visions of soaring spires, graceful flying buttresses, and sparkling stained glass. The term is also applied to the style of manuscript illumination that reigned in Europe from around 1200 to 1350. The Gothic illuminated manuscripts in this exhibition, drawn from the Getty Museum's collections, are characterized by whimsical marginal decorations, vivid narratives, and a naturalistic style of painting. The period also saw an explosion in the variety of illustrated books being produced, ranging from scholastic university treatises to entertaining romances. On February 27, the pages of the manuscripts will be turned to allow visitors to see additional treasures.

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February 7, 2012
The  Life of Art
The Life of Art: Context, Collecting, and Display
Daily, February 7, 2012 - Ongoing

South Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


From the time an object is made until the day it enters a museum's collection, it may be displayed, used, and perceived in different ways. The Life of Art takes selected objects from the Getty Museum's galleries and encourages visitors to sit down and spend time with them, offering the opportunity to examine them closely to understand how they were made and functioned, why they were collected, and how they have been displayed. Through careful looking, what may be learned about the maker and previous owners of a French gilt-bronze wall light, for example, or the transformation in England of a Chinese porcelain bowl? Close engagement reveals the full lives of these works and why they continue to be collected and cherished today.

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March 27, 2012
Renaissance Drawings from Germany and Switzerland, 1470–1600
Daily, March 27 - June 17, 2012

West Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


The period of 1480–1660 represents one of the high points in German art, spanning the careers of artists such as Martin Schongauer, Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach the Elder, and Hans Holbein the Younger. Because different styles of drawing developed in the various regions of present-day Germany and Switzerland, this exhibition of works from the Getty Museum's permanent collection is organized by region—the Middle and Upper Rhine, Switzerland, Nuremberg, and Saxony. The exhibition explores the drawings' wide range of functions and captivating subject matter, including mercenary soldiers and scenes of courtly love. It also presents important new scholarship in the field that has been accomplished during the past decades.

April 3, 2012
Portraits of Renown: Photography and the Cult of Celebrity
Daily, April 3 - August 26, 2012

West Pavilion, Terrace Level, Getty Center


Photography's remarkable propensity to shape visual identities has made it the leading vehicle for representing the famous. Soon after photography was invented in the 1830s, it was used to capture the likenesses and accomplishments of great men and women, gradually supplanting other forms of commemoration. In the twentieth century, the proliferation of photography and the transformative power of fame have helped to accelerate the desire for photographs of celebrities in magazines, newspapers, advertisements, and on the Internet. Drawn from the J. Paul Getty Museum's collection, the exhibition surveys some of the visual strategies used by photographers to picture the famous from the 1840s to the year 2000.

Herb Ritts: L.A. Style
Daily, April 3 - August 26, 2012

Exhibitions Pavilion, Getty Center


Herb Ritts (American, 1952–2002) was a Los Angeles-based photographer who established an international reputation for his distinctive photographs of fashion models, nudes, and celebrities. From the late 1970s until his untimely death from AIDS in 2002, Ritts's ability to create photographs that successfully bridged the gap between art and commerce was not only a testament to the power of his imagination and technical skill but also marked the synergy between art, popular culture, and business that followed in the wake of the Pop Art movement of the 1960s and 1970s. This exhibition features a selection of Ritts's vintage prints, magazine covers, Polaroids, and commercial video projects.

April 12, 2012
Self-portrait at age 17 / Fantin-Latour
The Getty Research Institute Collects: Recent Print Acquisitions
Thursday April 12, 2012April 12 - December 2, 2012

Research Institute Exhibition Gallery, Getty Center


Representing some of the finest works from the beginning of the 1500s through the late 1900s, this exhibition features recently acquired masterpieces, including Albrecht Dürer's classically inspired suite, Life of the Virgin, and his exquisite etching, Desperate Man. Piranesi's first edition Prisons present the kind of technical and formal innovations that have captivated print collectors, writers, and artists for 250 years; the Getty Research Institute's copy is an exciting discovery in a unique state of preservation. Besides highlighting collection strengths such as artist portraits and landscapes, the exhibition also features Karl Friederich Schinkel's designs for Mozart's operas, and a monumental 12-plate reproductive print after the Last Judgment by the so-called French Michelangelo, Jean Cousin.

May 22, 2012
In Focus: Picturing Landscape
Daily, May 22 - October 7, 2012

West Pavilion, Terrace Level, Getty Center


Nature's challenge to photographers is the theme of this second exhibition on landscape in the Getty Museum's In Focus series. Comprising approximately twenty works from the permanent collection, it looks at the various ways that photographers have responded to the test of depicting the breadth and perspective of a natural landscape through a camera lens. From the pre-photographic drawings made with the aid of a camera lucida to more recent advances in digital technology, the exhibition touches on a range of technical and artistic explorations by figures such as John Beasly Greene, Imogen Cunningham, Harry Callahan, and William Garnett.

June 5, 2012
Drama and Devotion: Heemskerck's "Ecce Homo" Altarpiece from Warsaw
Daily, June 5, 2012 - January 13, 2013

North Pavilion, Plaza Level, Getty Center


One of the most admired Netherlandish painters of the sixteenth century, Maerten van Heemskerck (1498–1574) worked in an expressive style influenced by his exposure to the work of contemporary Italian painters, particularly Michelangelo. His dramatic Ecce Homo (1544) altarpiece from the National Museum in Warsaw, Poland, on view to the public for the first time following conservation and study at the Getty Museum, offers a rare opportunity to experience a complete triptych by this Renaissance master. The exhibition provides insight into Heemskerck's materials and expedient technique and elaborates on the original location of the altarpiece in Dordrecht. Supported by the Getty Museum Paintings Conservation Council, this event also marks the 150th anniversary of the National Museum. The accompanying catalogue, beautifully illustrated with numerous color images, contains insightful essays on the artist and the creation and conservation of the altarpiece.

July 3, 2012
Gustav Klimt: The Magic of Line
Daily, July 3 - September 23, 2012

Exhibitions Pavilion, Getty Center


This retrospective is the first fully dedicated to the drawings of Gustav Klimt (1862—1918), one of the seminal figures in modern art. It explores the stylistic evolution of his drawings as well as their centrality to his artistic enterprise. Indeed, Klimt's paintings cannot be understood without careful consideration of his drawings, which also play a semi-autonomous role in his artistic output. Based upon assiduous study of the human figure, they are characterized by an unsurpassed mastery of line during all phases of his artistic development. This major loan exhibition was organized by the Albertina Museum, Vienna, in association with the J. Paul Getty Museum, to mark the 150th anniversary of Klimt's birth.

Exhibitions
February 5, 2012
Molten Color
Molten Color: Glassmaking in Antiquity
Daily

Museum, Floor 2, Getty Villa


In 2003, the J. Paul Getty Museum acquired a collection of over 350 pieces of ancient glass, formerly owned by Erwin Oppenländer. The works on view in Molten Color are remarkable for their high quality, their chronological breadth, and the glassmaking techniques illustrated by their manufacture. The vessels are accompanied by text and videos illustrating ancient glassmaking techniques.

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Roman Ephebe from Naples
Roman Ephebe from Naples
Daily

Getty Villa


Youth as a Lamp Bearer, a long-term loan from the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Naples, is on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Villa.

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March 28, 2012
Aphrodite and the Gods of Love
Daily March 28 - July 9, 2012

Museum, Floor 2, Getty Villa


From her genesis among earlier deities in the ancient Near East to her adoption in Roman culture as Venus, this exhibition explores the realms of Aphrodite, Greek goddess of love. It moves beyond the familiar aspects of desire, seduction, feminine beauty, and sexuality to demonstrate the various facets of this complex divinity: civic protectress, helper to sailors, and manipulator of mortals. Organized by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in association with the J. Paul Getty Museum, the exhibition includes objects ranging from large-scale sculpture to delicate jewelry drawn from both museums' collections as well as major loans from Italian institutions.